Training a bulldog requires different effort from training any other species of dogs. They are large and looking more aggressive. Sometimes, they can be stubborn, thus making it challenging to train the bulldog. It takes patience and consistency to train the bulldog. In fact, bulldog can be an affectionate and well-behaved companion, as long as you provide appropriate bulldog training. The training involves indoor and outdoor session. Therefore, you need to practice step-by-step training for your bulldog. Bulldog training involves some steps, from crate training, house training, to outdoor training.
Bulldog Training: Crate Training Steps
Getting Familiar with the Crate
Just like training steps for other species of dogs, bulldog training begins with crate training. This provides you and the bulldog with many benefits. For instance, you can prevent the bulldog from separation anxiety, stress, and even household hazards. Before initiating the training, make sure that you select the crate of the right size, again one that is neither too small nor too large.
The right crate provides enough space for the bulldog to lie, sit, and stand effortlessly, but not too large, thus allowing it to jump, evacuate, or even create a bathroom at one corner of the crate. If you want to have a crate that can accommodate adult bulldog, consider buying a crate with an adjustable divider. This type of crate allows you to increase the available size as the bulldog grows.
When you the right crate, the following are some important ways on how to train your bulldog in the crate:
- Make it a ‘comfortable home’ for the bulldog. The more comfortable it feels, the more likely that the bulldog spends more time inside the crate. For instance, you can put a comfortable blanket, his favorite toys, a comfy quilt over the area where the bulldogs love to sleep, and nice-looking feeding pots.
- Let the bulldog explore the crate. Of your bulldog is easily motivated by foods, put some puts in the bowl and place it near to the crate. With time, train to bulldog to enjoy the foods nearer to the crate. Finally, put the food bowls in the crate. Let the crate door open.
- As you play with the bulldog near to the crate, let the door open. Encourage him to explore the crate with his pleasure.
- Train
him with simple verbal command. For instance, “get in!” as an instruction to
enter the crate.
- Treat him when he successfully enters the crate after the simple verbal command.
Living Him in the Crate
Getting the bulldog familiar with the crate is different from leaving him in the crate. As he enters the crate comfortably, he can go restless when you leave him alone inside. To practice living the bulldog inside the crate, the following steps may help:
- Close the door for few seconds. Let him inside for some moments, and then open the door.
- If the bulldog whines or cries, do not immediately open the door. Instead, let him call down few seconds. Then, open the door.
- After he can handle the anxiety, close the door for longer. Then, open it again after few minutes. In create the duration of door closing as the bulldogs settles down.
It must be noted that baby dogs cannot hold the bladders very long. Even though they have been comfortable inside the crate, do not leave them too long. This is particularly true before the puppies reach the age of 12 months, when they can hold the bladders for an hour only.
Bulldogs are sociable animals. You can play with them while the bulldogs are in the crate. More importantly, never make a crate like a punishment place. Even though they misbehave, never send them to the crate as a way to punish them. Therefore, make sure they develop a positive association with the crate. It is a homey place for them.
Bulldog Training: House Training Steps
Choosing the Elimination Spot
The next step of bulldog training is house training. In this step, the bulldog learns how to use an outdoor bathroom. At first, you need to decide the area to be used for the dog to eliminate itself. It may be the backyard of your house. Again, make sure that the outdoor bathroom spot is protected from rainwater or things that may prevent the bulldog from accessing the area.
If your house does not have any backyard, you may choose an outdoor area, where the bulldog can eliminate safely. Then, make sure that the puppy eliminates in the same area every time. The bulldog will be able to identify the outdoor bathroom spot by smelling his scent.
Setting A Regular Elimination Schedule
After
choose the place, this is the time to set the schedule. A successful bulldog
obedience training session
is determined from whether the dog knows when he will be going to eliminate
himself outside. Make sure to train this as an early part of training, as a
defined schedule is particularly important for puppies. The schedule may vary,
for example:
- After eating, drinking, or playing
- Immediately after he wakes up in the morning;
- Before going to bed; or
- Any time you take him out
At the beginning, you may pay attention to the signs first. Then, stick to the same schedule for elimination. Normally, a bulldog puppy goes out from 4 to 10 times a day, while adult bulldogs eliminate 3 to 4 times a day. Before the bulldog reaches adulthood age, you may need to pay attention to the elimination schedule tightly. Therefore, if your schedule does not allow you to do so or nobody in your house can do the job for training the bulldog, you may need to hire a pet sitter to do it.
At last, make sure that you treat the bulldog for any good behavior and never punish any mistakes or misbehavior. Let the dog know when he does something right at any phase of the training. You may suddenly drop some foods to his bowl, give him new toys, or ask him for a walk in the afternoon. Or, give him verbal appraisal or body gestures. The positive rewards you give him, the better the bulldog knows that good behavior is favorable.
Bulldog Training: Walking on a Leash
Besides house training, you will need to train the bulldog in many other aspects, such as how to walk on a leash, when you take them for walking outdoor. At first, the bulldogs may show refusal to wear the leash by pulling in down. However, proper training will lead to the desired results:
- Train the bulldog to walk on a leash from indoor environment.
- Create a situation in which the bulldogs do not feel stressed when wearing the leash.
- Introduce the leash in small slices. In other words, you may introduce the collar first, then the lead.
- Lead the dogs walk under indoor environment. Let the bulldogs wear the harness around the house.
- Introduce them to outdoor setting gradually. When they have been settled with the harness, go a short walk to the backyard, for instance. Lead the way. Again, never let the dogs lead your way.
Walking on a leash may not be the first training sessions the dogs get. However, the earlier you introduce them to the leash, the better. This training usually begins when the dog is around 8 weeks old.
Bulldog Training Tips: How To Train Your Bulldog Effectively
The most important thing in the bulldog training is making sure that the training results in positive behavior and the dog practices everything he learns from the training. The lessons above need to be given under an appropriate condition. The following are some important tips to help you when doing step-by-step training for your bulldog:
- The shorter, the better; Unlike human beings that can concentrate on something for hours, bulldogs have very short attention. Experts recommend that each training session not to last longer than 10 minutes. Five to ten minutes is an ideal training duration to ensure that the training brings about positive results.
- One Session, One Lesson. Try to focus every season of the training on one lesson/command. Multiple commands may confuse the dog. You had better focus on one command but you see the results rather than teaching many tasks without any results at all. The dog may need some time to learn a command. Therefore, make sure to focus only one lesson for one session of the training.
- Start from the simplest command; Examples include ‘sit’, ‘stay’ or ‘heel’ command. You can begin the training from the food. The bulldogs behave positively when it comes to foods. So, teach them how to leave or how to drop the food first.
- Start from indoor training; It must be noted that bulldogs have a shorter face, thus making it difficult for them to breathe. Therefore, start the training indoor – under an environment where they can breathe well. Indoor training also prevents them from being exposed to humidity or heat, which may interfere with their breathing.
- Give them plenty of water at any phase of the training. Water is important to build up their airway. This is essential, as you cannot definitely know which circumstance is the most comfortable one for the bulldogs.
- Specify the training goals. Instead of specifying something that the bulldogs should not do, you had better specify positive things that the bulldogs should be able to do. You cannot just say, “My dog should not pull on the leash anytime he sees other dogs.” You cannot train something non-existent. Instead, specify defined goals of the training. For instance, you want the dogs to be able to greet people, spin to the right, open the refrigerator, or close the door.
Accordingly, before the training begins, you had better set the defined goals for each step. As discussed above, make them realistic. You need to be patient when training the dogs. The animal has a number of limitations. With appropriate training, the good practices will eventually become their habits.
Bulldog Training: How to Make the Good Behavior Happen
“Does the bulldog practice the good behavior after the training ends?” This is an important training. The answer to the questions determines whether the training is effective or not. An effective training logically leads to good behavior. Teaching simple activities, like “sit” or “up” may be easier than training the bulldog tow al on a loose leash.
Sitting and walking are integral part of their activity. On the other hand, walking on a loose leash is a new behavior. The dogs need reinforcement for the new lesson. The following are some tips to make sure that the good behavior really happen naturally:
- Set up the environment. Make sure to provide the dogs with the environment, which encourages them to do the good behavior normally and naturally. For instance, set up a place where the dogs should stand when someone opens the door. This prevents them from being kicked down accidentally. You may put a baby gate, and the dog stands behind it.
- Guide the dog properly. Lure him and guide him to move to the defined place. At the beginning, you can do this with a food treat or a favorite toy. When the dog is able to understand some body gesture, you can simply use hand movement to tell the dogs where they have to go.
- Wait patiently. The dogs need sometime to learn new behaviors and make them habits. Wait until the action takes place naturally. When the dogs are settled with the behavior, make sure to use the instructions consistently.
- Again, make sure that you always reward good behavior. Do not attempt to punish the dogs even though they fail a training session. The dogs do not understand whether they are doing right or not. However, when you treat them after doing something, the will do the same to get more treats. Finally, they will become new habits.
